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Welcome! I am taking a break from all of my "normal" blogging to spend a whole SIX DAYS talking about the best day of my life...my wedding day! Here is the schedule:

Day 1: How We Met

Day 2: The Proposal

Day 3: Engagement PhotosDay 4: Wedding Planning

Day 5: The BIG DAY

Day 6: Our Honeymooon

I hope that you stick around and that you enjoy learning a bit more about me in this mini-series!

Day 4 - Wedding Planning

(This was originally written as a guest post for Life...Unscripted. I edited it a bit for use here)

Our Story: Preparing to Say "I Do"

I had always wanted a wedding with sunflowers, but since we got married in May, that was kinda out of the question. So I needed a new "theme" to design my wedding around. My favorite color is pink, so that was a must, and my middle sister LOVES (I meanLOVES) orange. I thought it would be cool to let her wear orange. So we ended up with pink, orange, and yellow, with Izzies Soda as our theme.

I argued with my mom and sisters for MONTHS about what flowers we should have.

(I wanted roses, but they said daisies). I am SO glad we went with the gerber daisies. Aren't they beautiful? And they really do go better with the Izzies....

Planning is crazy (can I get an amen?). Praise the Lord that my mother is a MASTER planner.LOOK at these spreadsheets!

What made our wedding special and unique was that we made it special and unique.

No duh, right? Well let me explain.

1. We saved ourselves for each other.- Our first kiss was on our wedding day! We had a private moment after the "first look" to share our first kiss without 400 pairs of eyes looking on. (Yes, we had that many people at our wedding!)

2. We personalized the reception.- There were pictures of us on every table. The lunch and dessert bar (we didn't provide cake for guests) were labeled with tags telling the name of the food and which ones were our favorites.

3. We made most things ourselves.We had a friend make the bridesmaid dresses. They were amazing! And they fit so well. We were very thankful to her!

I had an "invitation making party" with close girl friends and my youth group girls.

We made the decorations. Our families drank the Izzies so we could use the empty bottles.

We decorated the sanctuary and reception hall ourselves (with some creative inspiritation with another lady from our church). That was so fun! I got to have the sanctuary look just how I wanted, and it provided some quality time with family.

A family friend (15 years old) made the cheesecake that Travis and I cut and ate and her mom arranged our flowers.One of my best friends did my makeup.A couple of sweet ladies from our church did our hair.We picked the food (salads) from family recipes that we loved and had several family friends make them for us.

4. I got my first ever manicure and pedicure the day before the wedding with my mom.

5. We had music played by dear friends and picked non-traditional stuff that we liked.

Our wonderful friends (now in Florida) played this song as my sisters walked down the isle - the processional.

A friend played and instrumental version of this song while I walked down the isle.

Another sweet friend played an upbeat instrumental for the recessional and other various instrumentals while we greeted/dismissed the guests. And one other extraordinarily talented friend played prelude music before wedding began. (We are blessed with talented friends!)

6. The entire bridal party (with the exception of the ring bearer and flower girl) wore Chuck Taylor Converse. (I love converse!)Sadly, we spent HOURS agonizing over this decision. Would it cost too much? We had taken EVERY cost precaution we could, and so this one splurge should not have sent us into such frustration...but it did. In the end, I am so glad we decided this. They were our gifts to the bridal party and they all LOVE them. The final effect we PERFECT. Just what I wanted. And guess what? My feet didn't hurt at the end of the day!!!(How many brides can say that?)

7. We had a recieving line where we quickly greet, hugged, and occasionally introduced to each other each of the 400 guests.Our wedding coordinator did her best to talk us out of this, but in the end, we weren't willing to budge on it. Although we did agree to make it go as quickly as possible. It didn't take more than 30 minutes and we personally said hello to everyone who attended our wedding. That took a ton of stress off and we could just relax at the reception.

Believe it or not, these simple, sweet little personalizations (and more you'll see in the days to come) made our wedding SO special!

We wanted the day to show us, who we were, and what we were like; it did.

The whole thing showed our personalities and love for God without it feeling put on. The day was designed for US, NOT for our guests and so we were comfortable and relaxed.It was special because we worked hard to make it that way and I am so glad that we did.

Advice for Planning:

Think about your guests, but not too hard. This day is for YOU. Make it comfortable for you and your fiance.

Spend time growing your relationship with your fiance. Have the HARD discussions. Talk about EVERYTHING. Get premarital counseling. Your relationship is the entire reason for this wedding and will be the sustain part of your marriage. WORK ON IT! =)